


Rambling Man

by Spooky66



Series: Songfics [5]
Category: The X-Files
Genre: F/M, Songfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-11
Updated: 2016-10-11
Packaged: 2018-08-21 19:49:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,204
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8258368
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Spooky66/pseuds/Spooky66
Summary: A songfic based off the song Rambling Man by Laura Marling. It is a Scully centric short piece that shows her development over her time in the X Files.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Here is a songfic for Octoberficfest! The song is Rambling Man by Laura Marling.  
> I was struck with sudden inspiration and wrote this in like five minutes. This song has always reminded me of Scully. To me the song is about a woman becoming who she wants to be despite what others have to say about it. If you have not heard it look it up right now!  
> I wrote out the lyrics and entered in a little blurb about Scully in between each section.  
> Happy fictober!

_Oh naive little me_  
_asking what things you have seen_  
_and you’re vulnerable in your head_  
_you’ll scream and you’ll wail until you’re dead_

* * *

Dana Scully grew up a Navy brat with respect for the government. They were the ones who employed her daddy and took care of them. The pride in her father’s eyes taught her all she needed to know about the U.S. government. She believed in the United States.  
When the FBI asked her to do her residency with them she felt that pride in each heartbeat. Her country wanted her to serve and so she would. Her father disapproved, of course, but she knew that he would come to understand that she took their offer for the same way he served in the Navy. She loved her country.  
In a few years she would find out that her country did not love her back. Teaching at Quantico was fine for a while but she wanted to be on the field and use her skills, even if that meant using those skills along side “spooky” Mulder.  
She didn’t believe him when he told her about all of the evil that the government was involved in. Dana did not want to believe that the FBI would put her in the X Files just to have her hide the truth.  
She did not try to pretend to be anyone else and she never would, even for the country that she had believed in.  
Mulder opened her eyes to the lies that she had been told from when she was just a child and, even though they made her want to close her eyes and run away, she knew that this was her fight now and she would never give it up.

* * *

_Creatures veiled by night_  
_following things that aren’t right_  
_and they’re tired and they need to be led_  
_but you’ll scream and wail till you’re dead_

_But give me to a rambling man_  
_let it always be known that I was who I am_

* * *

 

As the years went by Dana’s walk into the dark took her to places that she had never imagined existed.  
Her walk took her further from her friends and family and she found herself alone with only her partner to depend on. They were led down false paths, taken in the night, and stolen from but they kept fighting because they knew that in the end they were doing what was right.  
There were times when her friends, or her brother, and sometimes even her mother would tell her that she was running a fools errand. They had not seen the things that she had; they didn’t know what she knew. She knew that they were the fools but she would never tell them all that she knew because she did not want to ruin their innocence.  
Their anger could be forgiven because she knew that they were ignorant. Mulder thought that all should know every evil truth but Dana did not agree. She refused to subject them to the darkness. She had traipsed willingly into it and she could not let her family be dragged into it.  
So instead she lived a solitary life with a solitary man and let the darkness take her.

* * *

_Beaten, battered, and cold_  
_my children will live just to grow old_  
_but if I sit here and weep_  
_I’ll be blown over by the slightest of breeze_  
_And the weak need to be led_  
_and the tender are carried to their bed_  
_and its a pale and cold affair_  
_I’ll be damned if I’ll be found there_

* * *

When her body was falling apart and the cancer was killing she held on for Mulder and her mother.   
Maggie Scully had already lost one daughter and Dana could not bear to let her lose another. And Mulder… Mulder didn’t really have anyone else. When he looked at her she could see how desperately he loved her.  
One night he walked her up to her apartment and she kissed him. It was passionate and desperate. He began to move his hand under her shirt but stopped suddenly when his hand met her bare ribs.  
She had lost so much weight and she knew that he could feel each individual rib and it scared him.  
Mulder pulled away, kissed her forehead, and left quickly. That night she cried herself to sleep. He didn’t want to love a dying woman. She didn’t blame him.  
They moved past it and didn’t discuss it again for years.  
Between the cancer and losing Emily, Dana had become worn down. The search that used to be about discovery had become about finding answers that she was not sure she wanted. 

* * *

_But give me to a rambling man_  
_let it always be known that I was who I am_  
_It’s funny how the first chords you come to_  
_are the minor notes that come to serenade you_  
_and it’s hard to accept yourself as someone_  
_you don’t desire_  
_as someone you don’t want to be_

* * *

When she and Mulder finally did become lovers the world stopped for a little while. For a short time there was peace and she began to believe that there could be a life for them. The fight became exciting again and she enjoyed her work.   
Together they lit up the darkness that had started to invade their own minds.  
The peace did not last for them and Dana found herself alone again. Without Mulder she found herself lost.  
She wondered how it was that she had come to believe in nothing but Mulder? Dana would feel their child moving inside her and think back on all of the things that she should have said and done.  
If she had one more day with Mulder what I say? What would we do? Would he be excited about this child? She asked herself so many questions as she sprinkled dirt over the coffin that held his body.  
Memories of when he was alive haunted her. She thought of all of the wasted time and the meaningless fights and cursed herself.

* * *

_Oh give me to a rambling man_  
_let it always be known that I was who I am_  
_oh give me to a rambling man_  
_let it always be known that I was who I am_

* * *

It ended the way it always had and always will, her and Mulder together. Age had found them and taken its toll.   
Over the many years they had fought and cried. She had left in anger and come back in love. They had found their son and started a new life.  
The years had marked her skin and each wrinkle came with it a new lesson. Some days she would look at them and marvel at how much she had survived.  
These days they did not do much. Most of their time was spent reading, writing, watching movies, and taking walks.  
The last years of their lives brought peace they had not experienced before. Their son would visit often and always come with new stories of his own adventurous life.  
As Dana Scully watched the sunset from the porch of their unremarkable house she took her lovers hand and felt no regrets.


End file.
